Photographs From the Ongoing Turmoil in Greece

A riot policeman stands outside the National Technical University of Athens Tuesday amid the thick smoke caused by tear gas on Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2008. © AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris

Like much of the western world I've been reading about the current rioting throughout Greece, sparked by the December 6th police shooting of 15-year-old student Alexandros Grigoropoulos in Athens. The protests have received woefully little coverage in the North American media but are a monster story in Europe, where solidarity protests and even rioting have spread throughout Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Denmark and the UK. The unrest is an incredibly complex and significant event not just for Greece, but for the western world as a whole; indeed, it marks the first case of widespread domestic turmoil in a western democracy since the start of the current global economic crisis.

Admittedly, soon after learning about the riots my thoughts turned to imagining the photographs that would eventually surface. Right now there's a great 2008 Greek riots feature up on Boston.com with photographs from a variety of press agencies, while a cursory search of flickr returns a load of results. Both have the expected range of quality / approach and there are certainly some powerful images in the mix; however, I can't help but wonder if there's a fledgling Greek Koudelka out there somewhere, waiting to provide the as-of-yet-undiscovered definitive viewpoint — only time will tell.